Commercial
MOQ and setup: why one part costs more than ten, and where the floor is
There is no minimum order for most acrylic parts. There is a setup cost, and at low quantities the setup cost is the price.
Commercial
There is no minimum order for most acrylic parts. There is a setup cost, and at low quantities the setup cost is the price.
Customers often ask what the minimum order is, expecting a number. For most fabricated acrylic parts the honest answer is one, because a single part is a normal job for a routing or laser shop. What changes at low quantity is not whether we will make it, but what proportion of the price is setup.
| Cost element | Incurred once per order | Scales with quantity |
|---|---|---|
| Drawing review and programming | Yes | No |
| Material purchase (full sheet) | Partly | Yes, but waste falls with nesting |
| Machine setup and first-off check | Yes | No |
| Finishing setup (polish, print, bond jigs) | Yes | Partly |
| Inspection | Setup yes, measurement yes | Yes |
| Packing and documentation | Yes | Yes |
At one part, all of the once-per-order costs sit on one unit. At fifty parts they are spread, and the per-unit price falls sharply. At five hundred, the per-unit price approaches the actual production cost and stops falling.
Everything else, including laser cutting, routing, drilling, edge polishing, heat bending and UV printing, can be done at quantity one.
For a part with a lot of hand finishing, polishing or bonding, the price per unit barely falls with quantity, because the labour is linear. A customer who expects a hundred polished blocks to cost a fifth of ten is disappointed, and the reason is that the material was never the cost.
Conversely, for a simple flat cut part, the drop from one to fifty is dramatic, because almost all of the cost at one unit was setup.
If the quantity needed is genuinely one or two, it is worth asking whether a sample is the right instrument. A sample is a first article whose purpose is approval; a small production run is the same work. For a customer testing a market, a run of ten costs very little more than a sample of one and gives a real stock.
Our sampling lead time is 3 to 7 business days and production is 7 to 15 business days. At very low quantities the two are often the same job, and we will say so rather than quoting a sample and then a production order for the same five parts.
We will not quote a headline unit price based on a volume the customer has not committed to, because that price is not real and it makes the programme unplannable. A rollout quote states the price at the programme quantity and at a single-store quantity, and both are true.
For most fabrication, no. One part is a normal job. There are genuine minimums for screen printing, custom sheet colour, custom profiles and jig-based bonded assemblies, and we will say which applies to your part.
Because the setup, programming, material purchase and first-off check are incurred once and sit entirely on that one part. At ten parts they are spread over ten.
Yes. We quote the quantity breaks and they are valid for the stated period. What we will not do is quote a hundred price and supply ten at it.
Yes. The drawing, program and finishing specification are kept, so a repeat order does not re-incur programming. That is why a repeat is usually cheaper than the first order.
Down to about 1 mm features with the laser, though handling below 5 mm becomes the constraint. Small parts are cut on a sacrificial backing and packed on tape or in a tray so they are not lost.
Setup is the most abused line on an acrylic quotation, in both directions. Some suppliers bury labour in it; others hide it inside the unit price and then cannot explain why the price does not fall when the quantity doubles. A setup line is honest when you can check it against three things: what is being set up, how long it takes, and what the hourly rate is.
| Item | Typical time | Charged once because |
|---|---|---|
| Drawing and DFM review | 0.5–2 h | The review is done once, but it informs every unit |
| CAM programming and nesting | 0.5–3 h | Toolpaths and sheet layout are fixed for the run |
| Jig or fixture build | 2–8 h | Bonding and drilling jigs are physical parts that get stored |
| First-article inspection | 0.5–1.5 h | Measured once against the drawing, then used as the reference |
| Print file preparation and colour proof | 1–4 h | Artwork rip, test print and swatch approval |
Multiply those hours by the shop rate and you have a defensible setup figure. If a quotation shows setup at ten times that, the money is somewhere else — usually amortised tooling that the supplier would rather not itemise. If it shows zero setup on a bonded assembly with a jig, the jig cost is inside the unit price, and the unit price will not fall the way you expect at higher volumes.
The practical test is the second order. Ask what the setup is on a repeat: a genuine setup charge disappears or drops sharply once the jig exists, CAM is saved and the first article has been approved. A "setup" that is charged again in full on order two is a margin line wearing a cost label. We quote repeat orders with the jig and programming removed, and say so on the quote.
Send the drawing and we will quote one, ten and a hundred, so the small-run decision is made on real numbers.